How can I tell if my wiring is daisy chain or star?

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UFBplease

2 posts

Wannabe Geek

#139016 25-Jan-2014 02:30

I need to know how I would go about finding out if my wiring is daisy chain or star. I want star wiring since I am planning on getting VDSL soon and there is no way I can get it wired to where I want if it's daisy chain without having exposed cables through the house. I did look into how to tell if you have star wiring and I don't have a star wiring box or utility box that has cabling going to it. Is there a way of telling if it's star or daisy chain. I will also have to locate where all the cables meet up if it is star.

Info on my house:

I can't have a new cable wired under the house since it sits on a concrete slab. It would be confusing if I described my house so just trust me when I say I can't have it wired without exposed cables or plastic covers on several walls.

House was built about 5 years ago, 2007 (not by me).

I can plug my modem/router into any jackpoint and it works and the jackpoints only have 2 of the wires from the cables joined to the socket (don't know if this helps). I don't have multiple modems so I don't know what happens if I plug in a second one.

I can't get someone out just to see how my house is wired since an ISP wont pay for that and I don't want to pay for it either. I do plan on going from Telstra/Vodafone over to Snap, I might not change though if I can't get VDSL wired how I want it so that kind of makes things difficult.

From reading other posts I can see everyone suggests the coffeebaron to look at things like this but I don't live in Auckland.

Bung

6489 posts

Uber Geek

Subscriber

#973946 25-Jan-2014 06:43

You will more than likely have daisy chained jacks although the methods can be mixed. You can easily check this by undoing the faceplate. Expect to see 2 cables connected except for last one. Any with more than 2 is a star point. Unless you have an external test point/junction box one of the jacks could have 2 distinct cable types. That will be where the network joins to the internal wiring.

InstallerUFB

840 posts

Ultimate Geek

#973947 25-Jan-2014 07:27

Simple answer is to take off the face plates of your jackpoints - only 1 cable in each = Star / 2 or more cables attached in each = daisy or a combination of both

being able to plug your modem in at any jackpoint, and you still get ADSL, indicates that you dont have a master spliter installed

Judgeing from the age of your house it would either be cabled with 4 pair cat5e or more than likely two pair 'homelan'. So even if your house wireing is daisy chained and new cabling can't be run, providing there is a good spare pair in your house cableing, then it can be manipulted to provide a dedicated point for xDSL service.

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#973967 25-Jan-2014 08:56

If you have star wiring the master filter would be located within the ETP and the VDSL signal reticulated around the house using a spare pair of the existing wiring. This is done by simply joining the second pair with scotchlok connectors at each jack before the one where VDSL is required. At that point a new jack would be positioned next to the existing one.

ascroft

396 posts

Ultimate Geek

#973986 25-Jan-2014 10:32

Hey InstallerUFB - minor stuff but suggest some wording changes for you:

Was:
These are my personal views and not those of my employer - Downer NZ - or thoses of the Contract Principle - Chorus - who's contract I work under.

Suggest:
These are my personal views and not those of my employer - Downer NZ - or those of the Contract Principal - Chorus - whose contract I work under.

common sense is not very common

UFBplease

2 posts

Wannabe Geek

#974097 25-Jan-2014 14:14

InstallerUFB: Simple answer is to take off the face plates of your jackpoints - only 1 cable in each = Star / 2 or more cables attached in each = daisy or a combination of both

being able to plug your modem in at any jackpoint, and you still get ADSL, indicates that you dont have a master spliter installed

Judgeing from the age of your house it would either be cabled with 4 pair cat5e or more than likely two pair 'homelan'. So even if your house wireing is daisy chained and new cabling can't be run, providing there is a good spare pair in your house cableing, then it can be manipulted to provide a dedicated point for xDSL service.

I have looked at 2 jackpoints and they only have one wire. So I guess I can turn any jackpoint into the dedicated line.

hamish225

1418 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

#974118 25-Jan-2014 14:31

with mine they ran the cable up the side of my huse, into the roof space and then down a wall into a closet.

*Insert big spe*dtest result here*

webwat

2036 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#974544 26-Jan-2014 11:09

hamish225: with mine they ran the cable up the side of my huse, into the roof space and then down a wall into a closet.

Yup thats a good way to handle a concrete slab, if you can get into the roof at that point.run the cable down the corner of a wall and along just above the skirting to where you need it.

You should be able to find a hatch or cover plate on a wall somewhere that has a "110 punchdown" block inside it. You could change this to a small cabinet with a patch panel, master spitter and modem inside it. You will need to wire together the blue/white wires of all the outlets that you want shared on the same phone number.

Time to find a new industry!